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Month: February 2014

“Dallas Buyers Club”– Not for Cowboys (or, A Lone Star in the Fight against AIDS)

Dallas Buyers Club   Jared Leto as Rayon The true-life story of Texas AIDS pioneer, Ron Woodroof,  set in 1985 Dallas, depicts his battle to fight for his life after being diagnosed as HIV-positive. His search for life-supporting  experimental drugs via Mexico to help fellow HIV-positive people is the heart of “Dallas Buyers Club“. Part-time rodeo bull rider Ron Woodroof (the skeletal Matthew McConaughey in an Academy Award-nominated performance) is rudderless–smoking heavily, snorting cocaine, having a lot of sex with prostitutes. He is also grossly unsympathetic for...

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“Falling” —In and Out of Love

Falling A post-Valentine’s Day sleeper about romance with a Hitchcockian twist,  “Falling” is a story based on the real-life experience of the novelist Elizabeth Jane Howard.  Howard was courageous in exposing her vulnerability in this absorbing story originally produced for British television and now available on Netflix. Middle-aged novelist Daisy (Penelope Wilton, the fabulous classical actress of Downton Abbey and “The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel” fame), is  heartbroken by her husband’s infidelity and subsequent dissolution of her marriage. Escaping to her remote country cottage to write...

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Hi from Ojai!

We are always looking for a mini-vacation no more than four or five hours drive from Monterey. Several weeks ago we had the wonderful experience of staying at the historic Ojai Valley Inn and Spa, a glorious oasis directly east of Ventura. The wonderful climate of the Ojai Valley draws celebrities and regular folk to  rejuvenate their health in a sanctuary of tranquility at the spa or on the vast grounds where tropical birds in large cages talk to you in hilarious repetitions of whatever you say. The trails –especially the Pratt Loop–are easy and long, with sweeping vistas of the...

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